Replacement of multi-purpose furnaces with vacuum furnaces with low-pressure carburizing

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After presenting a lecture on this topic in Wroclaw, I was approached by several people asking if I was serious.

Yes, I mean it, and I’m sure it’s the way to go. The picture shows the assumption of the energy mix for Czech until 2040. Natural gas has a stable emission value of 255 gCO2/kWh and this cannot be changed, except in the case when we replace it with a completely different medium, e.g. hydrogen.

It’s different with electricity. The emission from the energy mix is variable and depends on the government sustainability policy. We can add solar panels to the heat treatment shop, but their contribution to our consumption is close to zero. Last year, Ipsen presented that one multi-purpose furnace would require more than 60 solar power plants on family houses.

So the road doesn’t lead here. We have to rely on the state. Compared to the original plan, the graph shows that the energy mix will fall below the level of natural gas sometime around 2027 year. Therefore, if we decide on a new investment today, we will receive it in 2025/2026. But in order not to be charged by energy and environmental taxes according to FIT 55, we have no choice and we have to invest in electrically heated furnaces with zero emissions. Are there any?

If we start thinking about hydrogen, then it is not simple either. Not every hydrogen is acceptable for our future heat treatment plant. Hydrogen electrolysers also need energy, and it must also be appropriately green.

Since yellow hydrogen will dominate in our location, i.e. from the energy mix, we have to wait with hydrogen until the energy mix drops below the value of natural gas.

Another question is the technical transferability of what we do on multi-purpose furnaces to vacuum furnaces with LPC. Probably everyone who thinks about it should start with an analysis similar to the one in the picture. Weigh all the pros and cons. What I have created is my subjective view. Is there any objective? Probably not, it will be different for each heat treatment supplier, depending on their range of work.

At the evening meeting, I met Mr. Akihiro Horita from the Japanese company IHI Machinery and Furnace Co., Ltd. We also got to this topic and here are his words: “everything you say here, we already have in Japan. Vacuum furnaces with oil quenching have become the basis of our heat treatment”.

So my smile on my face… so it probably won’t be complete nonsense